Former mayor of Pratt pleads guilty to selling oxycodone

CHARLESTON, W.Va. – Gary Fields, 68, the former mayor of Pratt, West Virginia, admitted to selling the powerful prescription painkiller oxycodone. Fields pleaded guilty today in federal court in Charleston to distribution of oxycodone, announced U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin.

As part of the plea, Fields admitted that he sold six 15 mg oxycodone pills to a confidential informant on April 23, 2015. Fields is scheduled to be sentenced on January 21, 2016.

The investigation was conducted by the Kanawha County Sherriff’s Department. Assistant United States Attorney Haley Bunn is handling the prosecution.

The prosecution is part of an ongoing effort by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of West Virginia to combat the illicit sale and misuse of prescription drugs and heroin. The U.S. Attorney’s Office, joined by federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, is committed to aggressively pursuing and shutting down illegal pill trafficking, eliminating open air drug markets, and curtailing the spread of opiate painkillers and heroin in communities across the Southern District.

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